First our declining morals slid, bit by bit, and then our very national spirit. Then the collapse became greater and greater, and our principles began to go, until at last, it has come to this age, in which we can bear neither our crimes nor the cure for them.

I know it's what you've all been waiting for so here it is, todays "Obituary of the Day".

Todays comes from the British periodical the Daily Telegraph. Enjoy

Maurice Roe, who has died aged 96, served variously as a Commando, and as an SOE and “Jedburgh” agent; he was awarded a Military Medal in 1945.

On the night of July 8 1944, wearing ill-fitting civilian clothes, Roe was parachuted into France near Pel-et-Der, in the Aube, attached to an SOE French Section Mission which aimed to revive the “Pedlar” circuit in the Marne.

Roe and his team were driven away as soon as they landed, but the Germans reacted quickly and two members of the Resistance were killed. After he had moved to a camp in the woods near Montier-en-Der, there were several skirmishes with the Germans; but Roe, as one of the two wireless operators in the team, was considered too valuable to risk on patrolling.

The local Resistance group lacked leaders and weapons. As a former Commando, Roe instructed the Maquis in guerrilla operations, selected landing strips for the delivery or dispatch of SOE agents and called down air drops.

At Wassy, he was given a billet in the chateau of a prominent local family. There he found that the family, uncertain which side was going to win the war, was hedging its bets by also playing host to a German colonel in charge of guarding the aerodrome at Saint-Dizier. Roe, who spoke good French, was able to pass himself off without problem, and enjoyed having his shoes polished by the colonel’s batman and receiving a salute from the sentry on the gate. Even better, the garden proved large enough for him to make his wireless transmissions without danger of interference.

His cover story, had he been captured, was to claim that he had taken part in the St Nazaire raid but had escaped and gone to ground. In October 1944 he returned to England. He was subsequently awarded an MM.

Herbert Maurice Roe, the son of a shopkeeper, was born on June 4 1917 at Ealing, west London, and educated at Ealing Grammar School. He had ambitions to become a missionary and, after leaving school, studied Philosophy in Belgium and Algeria.

At the outbreak of war he had a clerical job with Cerebos Salt. He had joined the Queen’s Westminsters TA in 1938 and he enlisted with their parent regiment, the King’s Royal Rifle Corps.

In August 1940 he volunteered for the Special Forces and, after joining 2 Commando, underwent rigorous training in Scotland. In March 1942 he was called to the War Office for an interview and missed the St Nazaire raid. Every man in his section was killed on the operation.

After being posted to the Small Scale Raiding Force, he took part in raids on the coast of France and on the Channel Island of Herm. He then moved to Fawley Court, near Henley-on-Thames, where he trained to become a wireless operator. Only five feet tall, he was known as “Knee-high”. The work was very tedious and, in classes, he use to bawl: “I’m not mad! Lemme out!”

This was followed by a posting to Milton Hall, near Peterborough, where he joined the “Jedburghs”, a band of men prepared to drop into Occupied zones in three-man sabotage teams.

After his return from France in October 1944, Roe was informed that SOE agents were needed in the Far East, and he volunteered to join their Force 136. The voyage to India proved tedious and he used to bellow at regular intervals: “Asia for the Asiatics! Turn the boat round!”

In March 1945 he was dropped into southern Burma. The object of his mission was to recruit Karen tribesmen and train them to harass the retreating Japanese. A post-operations report stated that “he was resourceful, never defeated, popular with the Karens and a continual source of merriment and fun”. He was mentioned in despatches .

Roe was demobilised early in 1946 in the rank of colour sergeant and joined Customs and Excise. He retired to live at Poole in Dorset.

Maurice Roe married, in 1953, Winifred (Wyn) Heyes. She predeceased him and he is survived by their two daughters and three sons.

Toay, we turn to the New York Times to pay homage to an American of obvious taste :

John Harney, the founder of Harney & Sons, a specialty tea company that helped restore the American palate for high-quality teas, died on June 17 at his home in Salisbury, Conn. He was 83.

The cause was apparently a heart attack, his son Michael, vice president of the family-owned company, said.

Mr. Harney was part of an informal community of American entrepreneurs and food pioneers who barnstormed the country in the 1980s and ’90s to acquaint restaurant managers, their luncheon patrons and the public — one afternoon-tea demonstration at a time — with the dying art of tea appreciation.

He conducted demonstrations for the waiters and waitresses at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York and for the book club at the public library in Rye, N.Y., introducing the nuances of aroma, body, complexity and aftertaste in loose teas from China, Africa and India to people whose experience with tea had often been limited to what came in store-bought tea bags.

An inveterate and jovial campaigner — he was involved in community affairs and politics, and helped secure the Republican nomination for a neighbor, James L. Buckley, in his unsuccessful campaign for the United States Senate in Connecticut in 1980 — Mr. Harney described his tea-promoting efforts, in a 2001 CNN interview, as part entrepreneurial and part inspirational:

“All we wanted to do was get out there and convert — sort of like St. John with his gospel of tea. That’s what I consider myself.”

Though far from re-establishing tea as the No. 1 beverage in America (status it lost as a tragic side effect, by tea lovers’ accounts, of the 1773 tea-tax protest that ignited the Revolutionary War), efforts by Mr. Harney and his like are credited with quadrupling tea consumption in the United States in the last two decades.

Harney & Sons, which began with a selection of six varieties in 1983, expanded its catalog to over 300 blends, many of them now standard fare at luxury hotels, including the Waldorf-Astoria and Ritz-Carlton in New York and the Dorchester in London.

The Historic Royal Palaces, which operates sites in Britain like Kensington Palace and the Tower of London, stocks its gift shops with a proprietary line of teas blended by Harney & Sons.

John David Harney was born on Aug. 26, 1930, in Lakewood, Ohio, to William and Hildegard Harney. His father, an engineer who moved frequently to find work in airplane factories, left his children with relatives after their mother died in the early 1940s, when John was 12. As a teenager he lived with an aunt and uncle who ran a country inn in Vermont.

He served in the Marine Corps from 1948 to 1952, then graduated from Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration. By 1960, he had moved to Salisbury to become part owner and innkeeper of the White Hart Inn, a two-century-old restaurant and hotel.

It was at the White Hart that Mr. Harney, a committed coffee drinker, was converted to the gospel of tea. His St. John was Stanley Mason, an Englishman who had settled in northwest Connecticut after 50 years in the London tea trade. In retirement, Mr. Mason had started a small company to blend and package premium teas, and he persuaded Mr. Harney to add some to his menu.

Mr. Harney’s guests liked the teas so much that he bought Mr. Mason’s company, hired Mr. Mason as his consultant and began a 10-year apprenticeship in the tea trade. In 1983, two years after Mr. Mason died, Mr. Harney sold his share in the inn and established Harney & Sons with family help and a handful of employees.

The company now reports about $30 million in annual sales and employs 150 people. It imports about a million pounds of tea each year, which it sells in the United States and abroad in a wide variety of styles and packages at prices ranging from $2 to $500 a pound. It moved its packaging operations to Millerton, N.Y., in 2000.

Besides his son Michael, Mr. Harney is survived by his wife, Elyse; three other sons, John Jr., Keith and Paul; a daughter, Elyse; a sister, Susan Rooney; a brother, Jerry; and 10 grandchildren.

Mr. Harney remained modest about his expertise. But he held to two absolute rules in making a good cup of tea, whether using a camomile from Egypt or a Darjeeling from India, a tangy black Lapsang souchong or a soft jasmine blossom pouchong.

First, to use “furiously boiling water,” he told The New York Times in 1983, defining furiously (with a thermometer he always carried in his pocket) as exactly 212 degrees Fahrenheit.

Second, to make sure it is properly steeped: “Five minutes,” he said. “No more, no less.”

Today we mourn the passing of Bobby Womack. Over to you Rolling Stone.......

Bobby Womack, the legendary soul singer whose career spanned seven decades, died Friday at age 70. A representative for Womack's label XL Recordings confirmed the singer's death to Rolling Stone, but said the cause of death was currently unknown.

The son of two musicians, Womack began his career as a member of Curtis Womack and the Womack Brothers with his siblings Curtis, Harry, Cecil and Friendly Jr. After Sam Cooke signed the group to his SAR Records in 1960, they released a handful of gospel singles before changing their name to the Valentinos and earning success with a more secular, soul- and pop-influenced sound. In 1964, one month after the Valentinos released their hit "It's All Over Now," the Rolling Stones put out their version, which went to Number One on the U.K. singles charts.

Three months after the death of Cooke in 1964, Womack married Cooke's widow, Barbara Campbell, and the Valentinos disbanded after the collapse of SAR Records. After leaving the group, Womack became a session musician, playing guitar on several albums, including Aretha Franklin's landmark Lady Soul, before releasing his debut album, Fly Me to the Moon, in 1968. A string of successful R&B albums would follow, including Understanding and Across 110th Street, both released in 1972, 1973's Facts of Life and 1974's Lookin for a Love Again.

In 2012, Womack began a career renaissance with the release of The Bravest Man in the Universe, his first album in more than 10 years. Produced by Damon Albarn and XL's Richard Russell, the album made Rolling Stone's 50 Best Albums of 2012 alongside numerous other critical accolades. "You know more at 65 than you did at 25. I understand the songs much better now," Womack told Rolling Stone at the time. "It's not about 14 Rolls Royces and two Bentleys. Even if this album never sells a nickel, I know I put my best foot forward." Upon his death, Womack was in the process of recording his next album for XL, tentatively titled The Best Is Yet to Come and reportedly featuring contributions by Stevie Wonder, Rod Stewart and Snoop Dogg.

Womack was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2009. "My very first thought was — I wish I could call Sam Cooke and share this moment with him," Womack said. "This is just about as exciting to me as being able to see Barack Obama become the first black President of the United States of America! It proves that, if you're blessed to be able to wait on what's important to you, a lot of things will change in life."